PAUL RITCHIE wants a final fling with Manchester City before he declares his love affair with the Blues is done and dusted.

The Scotland international has spent the last two seasons either on the treatment table or in exile at Derby and Portsmouth, but is determined to restart his stalled career.

Twenty-seven-year-old Ritchie believes he is coming into his prime as a defender, and is putting himself through a rigorous summer training campaign of daily gym sessions and work with an athletics sprint coach in a bid to get one jump ahead.

He fears his days as a Blue might be over but nothing would please him more than forcing his way back into Kevin Keegan's thinking.

Ritchie is one of a handful of City stars that the club would happily let leave as they tweak the squad and budget ready for the move to the new stadium.

The former Glasgow Rangers and Hearts star spent the final two months of the season at Pride Park on loan, but has no indication whether the financially embarrassed Rams - now under fellow Scot George Burley - can afford to offer him a permanent deal.

Few chances

"Ideally I would like to play for City but I have had little chance to show my worth over the last two seasons," said Ritchie today.

"When I came to Maine Road originally I played regularly in the Premiership and was being picked in Scotland squads, but recently my career has stalled.

"I feel I still have plenty to offer but like all players I want to be on the pitch. At the moment I don't know what is going to happen, but I am perfectly happy to work hard all summer and give it one last go at City in pre-season."

Ritchie finds himself in a dilemma that is becoming a familiar pattern as football chiefs tighten their belts. He still has a year to run on his City deal and, even though the Blues would probably allow him to leave on a free transfer, his wages remain a problem for clubs below the Premiership.

"Players are being shown the door all over the country, there must be 500 out of contract and looking for jobs. I have never know anything like it," said the Scot.

"I have to think of my family and future security. My little boy starts school this summer and my wife and I are due another baby in July. Ideally we would like to be settled and planning a future.

"I have a year left at City before becoming a free agent and it may be in my family's interest to see that out rather than taking a big pay cut.

Compromise

"It is a case of maybe compromising my professional needs with those of my family. It is a situation that lots of players find themselves in during the present economic climate within football."

In more financially flushed days, the Blues may well have come to an agreement to pay up all or part of Ritchie's remaining year, but that is becoming a more infrequent option.

"I think the biggest problem now is not getting players in, it is the number of players you are going to end up with at your club," reckoned the Blues boss who, so far this summer, has sold Steve Howey to Leicester and brought in Michael Tarnat and David Seaman.

"They are not going out the other way. It is nobody's fault, it is just the way the market is at the moment.

"I think Paul Ritchie is a prime example and I feel a bit sorry for him. He comes and sits and talks to me all the time and he asks what he can do and I have to say: `Nothing.'

"He is working as hard as he can but he is down the pecking order. It is up to us as a club, along with the player and his representative, to find a way for him to go and play football. Paul is a very good professional and is still only 27-years-old. He needs to be playing."

Few suitors

Defender Ritchie spent three months on loan at first division leaders Portsmouth in the middle of the season. Lack of funds in the first division have prevented would be suitors like Sheffield United and Ipswich Town coming in for the the man who has made only 17 starts for City in almost two seasons.

Keegan is struggling to see a solution and has sympathy for those who make up his squad.

"Players have also got to be willing to be flexible and up to a point they are, but, if you have a year and a half left on a contract and somebody asks you to take so many thousands of pounds per week less so that you can play, it is a difficult one. Footballers will have planned their lives on the contract they have got. I understand that.

"At City we try to keep them all happy but no-one is happy if they are not playing regularly, and especially if they are an experienced professional and not even travelling with the team.

"It is soul destroying for many of them but how many can you fit on a coach? All clubs at the top would need a coach 100 yards long.

"No club ever gets it exactly right. Eighteen months ago, the way the transfer market was then, half of our fringe players would have been snapped up, but now that is not the case."